New U.S. Mines Would Violate Treaty

Human Rights Watch, 7 April 2000

(Washington, D.C., April 7, 2000) Human Rights Watch today charged
that the Pentagon is pursuing a replacement for antipersonnel mines
that violates the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty. The United States has said it
will join the treaty in 2006.

The prototype replacement system for "dumb"
(non-self-destructing) mines has a feature that allows the weapon to
be victim-activated. The American soldier would no longer select the
target or control the weapon; instead the weapon would detonate
itself. This feature, called the battlefield-override-system, turns
the weapon into precisely the type of weapon the U.S. has said for
years must be banned worldwide.

"This weapon will be an indiscriminate killer unable to tell a
soldier from a civilian," said Stephen Goose. "The Pentagon's
alternative to landmines is no alternative at all." Human Rights
Watch, an international monitoring organization based in New York, is
a founder of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines, which
received the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize.

The prototype replacements for non-self-destructing mines were tested
in October 1999, and the Pentagon is about to award a major contract
for engineering and testing. A production decision is scheduled for
July-September 2002, with as many as 523,000 units expected to be
produced by 2005.

In September 1997, at the conclusion of negotiations on the Mine Ban
Treaty (also known as the Ottawa Convention), President Clinton
announced that the U.S. would join the treaty in 2006, if the Pentagon
had identified and fielded alternatives to antipersonnel mines by that
time. "The Pentagon is not likely to meet the 2006 deadline, and
the replacement systems they've developed so far would not be
compliant with the ban treaty," said Goose.

In addition to the battlefield-override-system, Human Rights Watch
expressed concern about the RADAM program. Current U.S. policy is to
end use of "pure" (stand alone) self-destructing antipersonnel
mines by 2003. The "alternative" being pursued is to combine
them in a projectile with existing antitank mines to create a new
mixed mine system called RADAM. DoD has asked for $47.7 million for
RADAM this year, with a final production decision to be made
October-December 2000.

"The Pentagon is planning to spend $150 million to procure a new
mine system that is illegal under the Mine Ban Treaty, and would have
to be destroyed after 2006," said Goose. "Does that make
sense?"

Human Rights Watch has presented a paper, "U.S. Programs to
Develop Alternatives to Antipersonnel Mines," to the National
Academy of Science's Committee on Alternative Technologies to Replace
Antipersonnel Landmines, meeting in Washington, D.C., April 4-5, 2000.
The Committee has been mandated by Congress to make independent
recommendations about potential mine alternatives.

Human Rights Watch recommends eliminating the RADAM program, removing
the target-activated feature from the non-self-destructing mine
alternative, and making compliance with the Mine Ban Treaty a clear
requirement for all aspects of the landmine alternatives program.
Human Rights Watch also recommends exploring seriously non-material
alternatives to antipersonnel mines (such as changes in doctrine and
tactics) instead of the Pentagon's focus only on material solutions.
Many military experts believe that alternatives to antipersonnel mines
already exist, as evidenced by the fact that 137 countries have signed
the ban treaty, including every NATO ally except Turkey.